All Rise – Season 1 Episode 11 Recap & Review

The Hearing

After last week’s cliffhanger, the latest episode of All Rise wastes little time giving us closure to the issue Lola is facing with her hearing. During most of the episode we see Lola dealing with the panel as they try to discredit her but she manages to come out of it even stronger. With no trial this week, All Rise offers up a much-welcome change of pace and an interesting storyline to further the overarching narrative.

We begin the episode with a worried Lola as she waits for her hearing from the commission and judicial performance. She meets with Mark in their usual spot on the stairs where they talk about their current situation before deciding to show their faces at the office Christmas party. At the party, Lola feels like all eyes are on her but leaves very quickly while Mark gets given an important case by Choi. He then approaches Amy Quin for help with his father’s case.

Back in her office, Kansky has made a list of the people who will be on the CJP panel for the hearing and talks about the people she knows will be against her as they plan to get one disqualified. Judge Benner approaches Emily and Choi and asks them to take part in a mock trial during family day, based on The Wizard Of Oz. They both reconvene around coffee to discuss the mock trial but Emily confronts him about the hearing Lola is facing.

At the hearing, Lola requests Deborah Thompson step down as they have history where she used to be a prosecutor and sent her some very unprofessional emails. Unfortunately, her replacement turns out to be Judge Laski which spells trouble for Lola. As he tries putting her on the spot about some of her decisions, Lola does her best to defend herself while explaining her reasoning behind her cases.

Meanwhile, Mark meets with Liam O’Hare, who wants to testify in his case against Trevor Mabbit. While Liam is guilty of some crimes, he still wants to go in front the grand jury to accuse Mabbit of drug trafficking because his sister died of a drug overdose. As the hearing gets underway, Laski mentions the Travis Bolson case and how Lola’s decision ultimately resulted in his death. As they take a recess, Lola starts to doubt herself but Kansky does her best to reassure her.

Lola decides to address the panel and does her best to defend herself, telling them all she sees things differently because of the person she is and how she was brought up. She is not bias but asks them if they can respect her enough to accept her differences. After reconvening, the panel votes in favour of Lola and decides she hasn’t been acting unethically.

At the end of the mock trial, Lola arrives as the Good Witch to give the happy ending while Mark decides to defend his father with the help of Amy. After an emotional moment with Kansky, Lola meets Judge Lasky on the stairs and he tells her that this hearing should be viewed as a challenge in her career to help her believe in herself more. However, as he leaves her, he warns her to keep her distance from Judge Benner.

During Emily and Sara’s housewarming party, Emily apologizes to Choi about her behaviour and they decide to discuss a plea deal in their case. Luke arrives and tells her that he passed his exams which prompt him to kiss her in front of everyone as she asks him to stay the night. The episode ends with Lola and Mark having their usual end-of-the-day talk and toasting to the New Year.

Things have been quite tense and emotional for Lola during the last two episodes as she started to doubt herself and faced a tough panel, trying to explain and defend her actions. She deals with it really well though, thanks in part to the help of Kansky who she shares a touching moment with. These two have had quite the evolving relationship through the first half of the season and it’ll be interesting to see where this one goes next.

As we reach the fall finale, All Rise has been quite the engrossing legal drama, with decent storylines and likable characters. The second half will probably concentrate more on Mark’s Father’s trial which will be quite interesting to watch, while serving up our weekly dose of trials led by the fair Judge Lola. Judge Laski also left her with an ominous warning about Benner and this is something I am hoping will be visited next year. All Rise may not be the best legal drama out there, but the series has been consistently entertaining.